


Self-Inflicted

by Seye



Category: Dangan Ronpa - All Media Types, Dangan Ronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc
Genre: Gen, Hurt No Comfort, Implied/Referenced Abuse, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Self-Esteem Issues, Self-Harm, Self-Worth Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-24
Updated: 2020-07-24
Packaged: 2021-03-04 22:07:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,875
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25493599
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Seye/pseuds/Seye
Summary: Everything is too much.Byakuya just needs some silence.
Comments: 1
Kudos: 39





	Self-Inflicted

It burned. The cuts that littered Byakuya's arms burned like hell. He stared up at the fresh wounds, the angry marks that seemed to throb even more the longer he looked at them.

It all happened so quickly. Byakuya did not expect to fall back into an old but familiar habit that he thought he'd gotten rid of ages ago. 

Really, it was a ridiculous thing for him to do. Just as he had been told all his life, he didn't have time to do such a foolish thing that the one's who couldn't handle themselves did. Yet, he still did it.

God, Byakuya truly was a failure. The others who "attended", or in other words, were forced to stay at Hope's Peak and participate in a killing game, may not have seen Byakuya that way, at least not as of now. They only saw him as the infamous Affluent Progeny, who was mostly all bark and no bite. But they weren't the ones who had been with him for years on end. They could never understand this amount of suffering.

They would never understand what it feels like to be told you're a failure, while also being told act like you're the best thing to ever walk planet earth.

They would never understand the internal conflict of believing both things at once, and Byakuya had no intentions of letting them find out. Though, resorting to slicing his skin open would make that a lot more difficult. He couldn't help but be angry with the world for making him this weak, with his father and siblings, for putting him through hell. Most of all, he couldn't help but be angry with himself. He was such a screw up that he couldn't even handle his own emotions better.

His father had been right all those years ago. He truly was the defect of his family.

He had other ways of coping with things. They were things that could have ensured he didn't do what he did. They weren't good ways of coping with the feelings he experienced, even he'd admit that. But compared to scarring his skin, it was an improvement. It was something his father told Byakuya to do. It was quite simple.

Ignore the feelings. Ignore the overwhelming urge to hurt himself physically so he didn't hurt emotionally any longer. "You're a member of the Togami family", his father had said. "You have no time for silly things such as emotions. Toughen up a bit, kid."

God, did Byakuya try his absolute best to do just that. He did everything he absolutely could to ignore whatever thoughts ran through his mind like a broken record. Going out and exploring the school didn't work. The silence of the library he tried to spend his time in only made the harsh sound of his own thoughts worse. And when  she  found him, the girl that reminded Byakuya so much of some of the people he wanted out of his mind due to what they have done, it pushed him to his limits.

His only other alternative to this failed him. He'd be lying if he said he understood why. Emotions weren't something he concerned himself with. He didn't understand why he couldn't ignore them like always. Why did he have to be so damn weak?

He was out of options by the time the nighttime announcements came on. And when he crept back to his room, there was only one thing he was thinking.

Too much.

Too much.

Too much.

Everything was too much for him. It was an average day, and by average, he means no one had died that day. He doesn't get what made him so overwhelmed. 

Byakuya shut the door to his room as quickly as possible. He needed to shut the real world out from his. He pressed his back to said door and slid down it, hiding his head in his knees while trying to pick up whatever pieces he could find scattered in his brain to solve the puzzle he didn't understand.

This feeling was not going to let up any time soon. That was one conclusion he came to, which was an obvious one that he should have understood from the start. 

Too much.

Too much.

Too much.

He needed peace in his mind, dammit. For a minute, a second, any silence he could get from the obnoxious thing at this point. He needed some kind of relief. That wasn't something he easily got, despite trying for hours on end. He didn't know what else to do. There was nothing he could do to ease the emotional pain he had been feeling for hours on end.

That was.. kind of a lie, Byakuya thought. There was something he could do, a familiar thing tied with the sweet relief of internal silence. It was a familiar pain, a burn against his skin. The boys all recieved toolkits when they first arrived, right? He could..-

_ Stop it. Shut the hell up. _

Fuck, it seemed desperate. Byakuya knew that. But he  was desperate. He hated coming to that realization, it stung even more than what he felt right now. However, it was the truth, he supposed. Logically, he knew it was a bad idea to fall down that hole once again.

Nonetheless, logic didn't seem to matter to the side of his brain that was screaming at him to do it for just one night. His mind felt as if it was at war with itself; the swords from both sides hitting each other with such intensity Byakuya didn't know which side to listen to. He'd tear up, if he was one to let himself cry. Even now, even when he felt like ripping his hair out and screaming, Byakuya wouldn't be caught dead crying.

"Do it."

"Don't you dare, Togami."

"You need it. That pain is what you crave."

"Don't do such a foolish thing."

Byakuya just wanted it to be quiet for one damn night. There was one way he could do that, the thought that crossed his mind never left. It stuck itself somewhere in his head and wouldn't leave until he did something about it. Regardless of what he chose, he would still be giving in to one side of his internal conflict, right? So, it doesn't matter. 

He doesn't matter. Someone as optimistic, such as Makoto Naegi would deny it. And his own ego would deny it. But Byakuya knew how the others felt about him. He tried not to care, yet it's hard to ignore some things, even if he doesn't quite understand them or the concept of emotions, just as he was raised to be. So, no, He doesn't matter. Going through with this wouldn't matter to anyone else in the end, and he would get what he needed for the night.

It wasn't the best way to deal with things, he'll admit that. But it was all he had.

Taking a deep breath, Byakuya raised his head from his knees and rose to his feet. As he approached the drawer that contained the toolkit male students were given on day one of this killing game, he could feel all the memories he had been surpressing for so long arising. It had been months since he was in a position such as this one. He felt ashamed of himself. He felt like he did upon the first time of doing this.

He remembers what drove him to this for the first time, a long day of torture and pain and work. He remembers his father finding out and screaming at him for hours on end, while his siblings came by the room, listened in, and then scrambling away in fits of giggles, taking joy in their younger brother's suffering. He remembers the tears and the hurt, he remembers the guilt and the pain. But he also remembers the urge to hurt himself reappearing after all that, after all it had caused.

Then one time became two, then three, and eventually it became an addiction, a vicious cycle Byakuya wasn't able to break out of for a long time due to the stress he had been in. He wasn't proud of himself, however, he was when he was finally able to stop and ignore it.

Doing it again, it brought back memories that he tried to shove to the back of his mind.

He now arrived at the desk- when did he get here? A few moments ago, he was only walking towards it. That thought, however, quickly disappeared as opened the drawer. Just as he reached his hand out to the toolkit, he could feel bile rise im the back of his throat. He barely managed to swallow it down. 

Byakuya carefully rolled up his sleeves. He reached his hand into the drawer, only touching the toolkit at first. He considered backing out and taking a deep breath. He really did. Yet when the day he just experienced flashed his mind; the trial, the loss of another student, the secrets that were revealed, he realized how little he cared about what happened to him in this moment.

He needed things to be quiet.

That was the last thing Byakuya remembers thinking, now laying on his bed, his eyes gazing at the damage he had done to himself. He felt a mix of emotions. Guilt, shame, and while relapsing like this did provide something, even if it wasn't necessarily relief, it didn't do much for the aftermath. It helped for a split second. Then again, that was what he asked for, was it not?

God, he was such a failure. Was this how a commoner felt when doing poorly on a task they were given? It was the closest thing he could compare what he felt to, and Byakuya decided that he despised this familiar feeling. 

Numb didn't describe it well. It wasn't that he felt nothing, he just felt something he didn't understand. As a commoner would put it, he felt like shit. Frankly, that was all Byakuya planned to leave it as. He wasn't going to spend his time on something as absurd as pinpointing how he felt like a toddler at the doctor's office. He was still a Togami, after all. He had standards, he had no time for such a silly game. Especially now, in the midst of a life or death situation.

With the burning sensation still lingering, Byakuya moved to lay on his side. He would let this pain serve as a reminder of who no one else could see. He knew he was the screw-up of this group, but the only one who could know that is Byakuya.

With that thought on his mind, Byakuya closed his eyes. Tomorrow would be another day of the same old routine. Tomorrow would be another day in the life of Byakuya Togami, the two sides of him that were entirely different from one another. But he would rather die than admit that out loud, so for now, he would play the role he was expected to portray. He would act as if he didn't feel like the scum of the earth.

He would be the Byakuya he was raised to be.

**Author's Note:**

> heya! it's been a while since i've posted on here. i hope you've been well!
> 
> this was a a projection thing for me, but i tried to make it seem in character because byakuya is a huge comfort character/kin of mine. i hope it's okay!


End file.
